Dear Don and List,

Being so thorough I doubt that VN would have become so openly critical about Freud if he had not read some of his works and even dropped hints about his works in his novels.

I thought I could identify Freud´s "Traumdeutung" and his most famous dream ( The Irma Injection ) by his referene to a "Bellevue" with Dorothy Vinelander lapping at Van´s ears to tell him her dreams.

Sometimes various reference to Mme Sègur in Ada were not made very far from "spankings" or "nymphobottom"and made me think of another article by Freud ( where he quotes Mme Sègur ): " A Child is Being Beaten".

Below there we find an apparent non sequitur when the Governess mentions Sègur and "The Merchant of Venice", and Ada brings up "King Lear":

"Et pourtant,’ said the sound-sensitive governess, wincing, ‘I read to her twice Ségur’s adaptation in fable form of Shakespeare’s play about the wicked usurer.’

‘She also knows my revised monologue of his mad king,’ said Ada"

There is an article called " The theme of the three caskets" where Freud elaborates extensively on both King Lear/Cordelia and the three caskets in the Merchant of Venice to emphasize the importance of the number "three" ( daughters, caskets, fates).

Does it seem too far-fetched to suppose that Freud was being indicated there?

Jansy